Mordkessle’s market churns under bone arches, bright with lanterns and harsh with watchful eyes. Slaan threads through the stalls with Kina, Shadow Striker, and the Witness tucked close, while city hunters and Chapel scouts move somewhere beyond the crush.
The Witness falters beside a spice cart. Their outline shivers, then thins, as if the light cannot agree on their shape. Nearby merchants go still, heads turning toward the wrongness in the air.
Kina
That is not a wounded person. Slaan, you brought a construct.
Shadow Striker
Hunters on the east walk, and Chapel eyes on the west. They have seen it too.
A cluster of black-coated figures slows at the far end of the lane. One of them lifts a charm-stamped hand and points straight toward the Witness. The crowd parts in uneasy ripples.
The Witness
I was made to hold what they hid. If they take me back to the ruins, it wakes.
Slaan’s path narrows to a single choice, the ruined splice ahead and the closing hunters behind. The Witness is the key and the fault line, and now both factions are converging on the same broken ground.
✓ Quest Accepted
Escape the hunters in Mordkessle
✓ Quest Accepted
Protect the Witness from capture